ESPN pulls Apex Legends tournament from TV following mass shootings

A hit at gaming and esports has been made as ESPN has decided to pull their broadcast of the X Games EXP Apex Legends Invitational off of ESPN2. This information comes from a tweet from Rod “Slasher” Breslau.

This moves comes following the the recent mass shootings that took place in Dayton, Ohio and El Paso, Texas. ESPN gave full credit of this decision to the tragic events.

“Out of respect for the victims and all those impacted by the recent shootings, ABC will no longer air “EXP Invitational APEX Legends at X Game” on Sunday, August 11, 2019 in the 4:00 – 5:00 PM / 3:00 – 4:00 PM PT time period,”

Originally set to air on Sunday, August 11, 2019 at 4 PM ET, the tournaments slot will now be filled with an episode of E:60 titled “Forever Broncos.”

ESPN and ABC has made the decision not to air the TV broadcast of the XGames Apex Legends EXP Invitational that was scheduled for this weekend, in response to the recent mass shootings, according to an ABC Affiliate TV station source pic.twitter.com/6BMwdbk93t

The screenshot provided by Breslau provided all the information explaining what is actually somewhat of a reschedule. According to Breslau, fans can still catch the hour long recap on ESPN3 with the full broadcast being “shown on TV at a later date, according to an event source.”

Information on when it will be aired can be found below:

Sunday, October 6 at 5p ET on ESPN2

Tuesday, October 15 at 11p ET on ESPN2

Sunday, October 27 at 4 ET on ESPN2

This, of course, shows that while ESPN is not totally against airing the esports competition’s content, the timing just didn’t fit for the company.